Wayback Wednesday: “That’ll Be The Day”
May 27th, 1957, one of the greatest songs in Rock N’ Roll history was released…That’ll Be The Day by Buddy Holly and the Crickets came out on Brunswick Records. The song rocketed to #1 in the Summer of ’57, and also reached #2 on Billboard’s R&B chart. Buddy wrote the song with Jerry Allison and originally recorded it as Buddy Holly and The Three Tunes on July 22, 1956 in Nashville for Decca Records. Since Decca was displeased with Holly’s previous singles for them, it never released this one. Holly’s producer Norman Petty re-recorded it with Holly’s new band The Crickets in February of ’57, in Petty’s studio in Clovis, New Mexico.
The really strange thing? Brunswick was a subsidiary of Decca Records. And Holly wound up getting signed by Decca to another of its labels, Coral Records. So recordings under Buddy’s name were released on Coral, while the Crickets came out on Brunswick. This despite the fact that the Crickets played on many of the Buddy Holly recordings. It’s amazing to think that Buddy Holly’s career lasted just over a year and a half from his first hit record…That’ll Be The Day…to his tragic death in a plane crash on February 3, 1959.
https://youtu.be/IcnOpbtvtpw
